Hug Story
by sebastienne
Summary: As mordor gets closer and the pull of the ring gets stronger, Frodo has only one thing left to hang on to . . . please review!
1. just for one night

Frodo stumbled and fell, badly bruising his hip on a sharp rock. He would have thrown out a hand to protect himself much sooner, but he had been holding onto the ring and stroking it with his thumb.  
  
'Now, mister Frodo' said Sam as he ran up behind him, his voice full of concern, 'what would mister Gandalf say if he could see me, letting you get so tired as this? It's time for you to rest, let's find you somewhere to lay down'.  
  
Eventually they came to an overhanging rock, hardly enough to shelter them from the weather, let alone the prying eyes of Orcs should Gollum have informed them of their coming.  
  
The pitiful creature had not been seen for several days now, and there was no clue as to where he had gone.  
  
Sam fussed over his master, trying to make him as comfortable as possible in the barren wasteland.  
  
The path into Mordor seemed impossibly long and arduous.  
  
Frodo appreciated all Sam's efforts, but he knew he would not be able to sleep that night . . or any night. The ring felt impossibly heavy on the chain around his neck, and he found himself rubbing it between his fingers constantly, just to assure himself it was still there.  
  
He had not had a full night's sleep since Lothlorien.  
  
His sleep, such as it was, had been fitful, full of dark and sinister dreams. He often woke suddenly and violently, the image of a great fiery lidless eye burning in his mind.  
  
Not to mention the fact that, no matter how he curled up and wrapped himself up in his elven cloak, Frodo always felt bitterly cold.  
  
Once he was satisfied he could do no more to aid Frodo's comfort, Sam lay down to sleep. He was out in a moment.  
  
Frodo tried in vain for a very long time to get to sleep. When he finally did, he reawoke with a start. He had dreamed that one of the Nazgul was descending on his mountainside hideaway (little more than a slight indent in the rock, really), Morgul blade raised, ready to claim the ring.  
  
Frodo awoke to see that there was no such threat, and shivered both from the cold and from exhaustion.  
  
He was so cold!  
  
He looked jealously towards Sam, who was breathing steadily with a contented half-smile on his face.  
  
Frodo moved closer to Sam, so as to share the corner of Sam's cloak. As he wrapped the corner of Sam's cloak around him, in a vain attempt to conjure some warmth from the freezing air, he felt Sam's warm breath on his face. It smelt, somehow, of mushrooms and ale, although neither had tasted these delicacies for many moons.  
  
It made Frodo think of home, of the Shire, a place he was resigned to never seeing again.  
  
Frodo was still shivering, so he slid himself right under Sam's cloak until he tentatively pressed his body to the sleeping form of his friend.  
  
Frodo rested his hand on Sam's chest, and snaked his arm around his waist.  
  
He was not worried he would wake his friend, as Frodo knew how heavily Sam slept in comparison to his own fitful sleep.  
  
The feeling of having Sam so close to him, their breathing falling in rhythm, the smell of Sam's skin in his nostrils, the faint feeling of Sam's warm breath rustling his hair, gave Frodo a profound sense of comfort.  
  
He closed his eyes, snuggled closer, and found himself in his warm, cosy bed at Bag End, all tucked up for the night with the expectation of some huge party the next day.  
  
Before he knew it, he was in a deep, refreshing sleep. He slept as if he hadn't slept in months, which was, in a way, true.  
  
As Frodo slept, Sam's eyelids fluttered open and their owner returned to consciousness. He was stunned to find he was being held in a tight embrace by his long-time secret love.  
  
Sam's head was filled with a whirlwind of emotion and conflicting explanations - perhaps Frodo had moved like this naturally, in the course of a dream; or perhaps it was entirely platonic, just a sensible idea to share body heat. What Sam hardly dared believe was that Frodo might know of and . . . just maybe . . . return his love.  
  
Feeling Frodo's heartbeat against his was almost too much for Sam, and he trembled with excitement. He snaked his own arm around Frodo and, with his elbow in the small of his back and his hand between his shoulder blades, pulled him closer.  
  
To smell Frodo's hair, and feel his soft, warm breath caressing his neck, was so much greater a sensation than Sam had ever imagined it - and he imagined it often. It was hard for him to be sure that this was real, and not just another wonderful dream.  
  
Sam traced his hand to the top of Frodo's back, and with feather-light fingers explored the back of his delicate neck.  
  
He began to tangle his fingers into Frodo's hair, when Frodo reacted unconsciously to the soft sensation by raising his chin, moving his head backwards.  
  
Sam looked at his face, mesmerised. There was no rapid eye movement, fear or panic on Frodo's face, as Sam had seen so much recently. There was just a sense of peace. Frodo's lips were moist, and slightly parted. It took all of Sam's will power not to incline his head and kiss Frodo's sleeping mouth.  
  
'Why shouldn't I kiss him?' Sam thought, 'Why, he's fast asleep, he'd never know'.  
  
Sam stroked his master's hair tenderly; spellbound by the way in which Frodo's full red lower lip trembled slightly with each breath that troubled it. He ran his fingers gently across Frodo's forehead and down his cheek, and around the outline of a delicately pointed ear. His touch was virtually imperceptible, so gradual and caring.  
  
Sam brought all his fingers round and cupped Frodo's chin, softly running his thumb across his lips.  
  
He traced the outline of Frodo's mouth with his forefinger, drinking in every curve. He fully expected this to be the only time he would ever get this close to him.  
  
Sam delicately placed the tip of his finger in the middle of Frodo's lower lip. He found no resistance at all, as the finger pressed the soft flesh and found itself just in front of Frodo's teeth, feeling the soft insides of his lips, feeling each breath rush past like a miniature tornado.  
  
Sam brought his hand round the back of Frodo's head, twisting his fingers smoothly into the curly hair. He gazed at Frodo's face, entranced, and then inclined his head, just for a moment, to touch his own lips to Frodo's.  
  
Just a gentle brushing of lips, no force or pressure. But it was enough to make Sam tremble, to make his head buzz and spin with pleasure.  
  
He leaned in again, with the same lack of force, but for just a little longer. He was becoming more confident.  
  
Pulling away, after what seemed like an eternity, and yet like no time at all, went against everything Sam had dreamed of up until this moment. So he did not pull fully away, but closed his lips until he could just feel Frodo's full lower lip between them, and let his tongue run lazily across it.  
  
Again, Sam tried to exercise self-control and pull away, but the realisation of years of dreaming was too great a price to pay for a little bit of self-discipline. He kissed Frodo, sucking gently on his smaller lips and running his tongue where his finger had been just a few moments earlier.  
  
It took Sam a moment to understand what he was feeling when he felt another tongue slip through parted teeth to caress his own. He responded instinctively, darting carefully around, slightly increasing the pressure his lips made on that porcelain face.  
  
Frodo moaned softly, and slid his hand up Sam's back and neck, to hold his head closer.  
  
Sam didn't know how long Frodo had been awake and conscious of his actions and, somehow, it didn't matter.  
  
Sam kissed the end of Frodo's chin, and then continued down his neck, sucking and kissing in equal measure. But Frodo brought his head down, level with Sam's, and brought it back up again with the force of his kiss.  
  
They held each other, hands twisted in hair, holding necks and gripping backs, as tight as they possibly could, as if they were afraid that, at any minute, the other might disappear in a puff of smoke, and prove to have been no more substantial than a dream.  
  
They kissed as if the world was ending, which it quite possibly was.  
  
Sam broke away, a new wave of paranoia flowing through him. What if mister Frodo was having some kind of a dream, thinking he was someone else, and would be shocked to wake and find himself kissing an ugly, fat gardener?  
  
'Sam, what's wrong?' said Frodo.  
  
'I'm sorry, mister Frodo sir, I'm really sorry. I didn't mean . . .' and he began to shrink away, ashamed of his presumptuousness and arrogance.  
  
But Frodo griped his shoulders, saying 'Sam, please! I need you close to me, can't you see that you are all I have left?'  
  
Saying this, he curled himself tightly between Sam's shoulder and the ground, half pulling Sam on top of him. He pulled Sam into him, one hand tangled in his hair, the other in the small of his back, as they kissed again and again.  
  
It was Frodo who pulled away this time.  
  
'What is it mister Frodo? Is there something wrong?'  
  
'Oh Sam, can't we be any closer? I still feel so cold!'  
  
The only barrier left between them was their clothes, which they began to remove rapidly, kissing in between garments being pulled over heads. Soon they had only the elven cloak blanket, and each other, to keep them warm.  
  
Frodo ran his hands all over Sam's naked back and shoulders, around his neck, across his chest. He found it hard to convince himself that this apparition, this dream-spectre, in front of him was really real, but he seemed solid enough.  
  
Still rubbing his back and neck, Frodo put his lips to Sam's ears and whispered:  
  
'Hold me, Sam.'  
  
Sam did as he was told, his strong arms wrapped right round Frodo, holding him as close as it was possible to be, without two people fusing into one. They were completely naked, except for the chain which Frodo would never mindfully remove from around his neck. It was the only thing between them. Sam felt that if ten thousand Orcs were to come, he would take them all on to protect Frodo.  
  
Their legs entwined, their bodies pressed together, the two hobbits kissed passionately.  
  
After a while, the kissing stopped, and Frodo rested his head in the crook of Sam's shoulder.  
  
Both hobbits slept.  
  
Safe, warm, loved, a haven of bliss radiating warmth into a cold, unforgiving night.  
  
The next day, they knew, they would have to face even more trials and miseries. But just for one night, they found comfort in each other.  
  
The barren, uncaring rocks looked on. A whole dead mountainside brought to life by the love of two little hobbits. 


	2. goodbye, my precious

The sky was perpetually dark.  
  
Frodo and Sam walked on and on, however, with renewed hope.  
  
There seemed to be a reason for what they were doing which had more significance than the mere destruction of all Evil.  
  
Gollum had returned, with no explanation for his long (yet, in retrospect, welcome) absence. He was leading them towards a short-cut through the mountains, a great interconnection of dark, dank caves. A more horrible journey could not be taken in all of Middle Earth, but Sam and Frodo felt they could face it together.  
  
Gollum wondered why, when they stopped to rest, the hobbitses would sit without talking, just lacing their fingers together, looking into each other's eyes. He missed feeling that kind of emotional closeness - desire for the ring had taken away his power to love.  
  
That very same day, they reached the caves they had been so long heading for. Something seemed to have given the two hobbits extra incentive and speed.  
  
They walked into the forbidding caves. Into darkness and silence.  
  
Into Shelob's lair.  
  
The great spider, older than Middle Earth and, if Sam and Frodo did not succeed in their quest to destroy the ring, quite likely to outlive it.  
  
She lived in these caves, filled with bitterness and malignity. There were no others of her kind . . . perhaps there never were, perhaps she outlived them, perhaps she killed them . . . But she was completely alone.  
  
People came her way from time to time, but she invariably killed them with her poisonous venom. What possible reason could there be for her to spare anybody's life, when she herself found pleasure in the act of killing? Although pleasure was an empty word . . . alleviation from the tedium and depression of aeons of darkness would be closer to the truth.  
  
So Gollum left the Hobbits alone in the darkness and Shelob attacked them. It had all been planned.  
  
She would have killed them both had it not been for the phial of light that Galadriel had given Frodo.  
  
Galadriel had bottled all the purity and beauty of Lothlorien in a tiny phial. It was the opposite of everything that Shelob had lived for - selfishness, bitterness, malignity. It was a tiny glass of love and light and beauty and truth, and it pained the great spider-beast to the very core of her being.  
  
Having been in darkness for so long, Frodo and Sam found it hurting their eyes as well. But that was nothing compared to what it was doing to Shelob.  
  
Shelob was writhing against the purity of the light, but still she wrapped Frodo in a binding, sticky web. He was unconscious, his head lolling around on his shoulders as if he were dreaming.  
  
Which, in fact, he was. The same dark dreams which always tormented him, of Nazgul and Orcs, of the death of his friends, of torture and battle and a vast, burning, lidless eye.  
  
These dreams differed from usual in but one way - that as Shelob's bitter venom coursed through his veins, there was no chance of him waking up from them.  
  
Filled with a courage greater than he had ever called upon before - or perhaps it was not courage, but blind rage and desperation - Sam took the elven blade and plunged it into Shelob's soft underbelly, again and again, until his hand was covered in her vile blood.  
  
Having failed trying to use light to destroy Shelob's evil, Sam found that the only way to do it was to fight darkness with darkness.  
  
As Shelob scuttled away, wailing, Sam's glance turned back to his beloved master, who was lying in the filth bound in a foul, sticky web.  
  
He took his blade again, and cut right through the threads which were binding Frodo.  
  
Sam knelt in the filth next to Frodo, and looked at his still, pallid face. There was no life in that face now, so unlike the night before when it had come alive in a thousand gentle kisses.  
  
He held his hand to Frodo's lips - no warm breath caressed his fingers.  
  
He lay his head on Frodo's chest - no heartbeat fluttered in his ear.  
  
Sam knelt over his barely-realised beloved, hand cupping cold cheek, bitter tears washing away the grime of their burdensome journey from Frodo's face.  
  
He gazed at the porcelain skin, the delicate features, the lips like two petals on a dying red rose - so beautiful in their decay, even in full knowledge of the fact that they will waste away to nothing.  
  
He lent in and kissed the form of his precious.  
  
It was a completely different sensation, cold clammy lips instead of a warm, breathing, vital mouth.  
  
Sam's tears washed all over his lover's face, mingling with sweat and grime.  
  
Memories of the night before flashed through his mind. Memories of safety, comfort, unity, hope . . .  
  
He had failed his master.  
  
Just for one second he had allowed himself to believe that they could succeed. He must have let his guard down to allow this to happen.  
  
He had failed.  
  
Sam wrapped his arms around Frodo's shoulders and pulled him into a sitting position.  
  
He was heavy and cold.  
  
Sam held him tightly, and rocked backwards and forwards, tears streaming from his eyes.  
  
'Oh, mister Frodo sir! I'm sorry! I'm so, so, sorry.'  
  
He stayed like that for a very long time, no thoughts in his mind but memories, as he relived every moment that they had ever shared.  
  
He catalogued them all.  
  
He did not want to forget a single one, as he was not going to be experiencing any more.  
  
Eventually, he opened his eyes and, so very reluctantly, lay his love down.  
  
He knew what he had to do.  
  
He would take the ring, through whatever trials the land of shadow presented him with. He would take the ring and throw it into the furnace of Mount Doom. He would destroy the ring.  
  
No doubt he would be destroyed with it, but that was part of the intention. The whole of Middle Earth would know, Sam was sure, when the ring was destroyed.  
  
They would look towards the dark clouds clearing over Mordor, and those that knew would say 'Frodo did it! Brave Frodo Baggins took the ring of power all the way into the heart of Mordor and destroyed it!'  
  
For centuries after, children would turn to their parents and say, 'Tell me again the story of the courageous Frodo who destroyed the powers of darkness', and parents across Middle Earth would tell, again and again, how it was Frodo's heroism which had saved them all.  
  
Frodo would live on, unforgotten, in the memory of the destruction of the ring.  
  
Sam was sure that, had he lived, Frodo would have marched up to Mount Doom and cast the ring into oblivion. But through Sam's negligence, Frodo could no longer do so.  
  
Sam would finish Frodo's quest for him, and the all would be as it should be.  
  
With a heavy heart, Sam unclasped the ring from around Frodo's neck, and fastened it around his own.  
  
It seemed impossibly heavy for so small a thing.  
  
Sam wrapped Frodo in his elven cloak in the hope that it would keep him camouflaged. If, by some miracle, Sam were to return from Mount Doom, he would come back here and hold his beloved until the coming of the fifth age.  
  
But Sam had little hope of that.  
  
He stroked Frodo's hair as he pulled the cloak up to completely cover his head.  
  
'Goodbye, my precious,' he said. 


	3. they took everything!

Sam walked, heart heavy, towards the mouth of the cave. It was the hardest thing he had ever had to do, to make a conscious decision to abandon his friend, his lover, his master.  
  
The ring felt heavy around his neck. It was tempting him, begging him to put it on.  
  
Sam ignored it. Mister Frodo had never given in to the power of the ring, and besides, Sam was resolute that he would never fail his master again.  
  
The ring filled his mind with images of 'Samwise the Strong, Hero of the Age', brandishing a fiery sword and single-handedly defeating all the armies of Mordor. It filled his head with offers of glory and fame, of longevity and prowess . . . if he put on the ring.  
  
But Sam saw these offers for what they were - idle fantasies, designed to appeal to the weak of mind.  
  
Sam did not want glory, or fame or prowess. He did not want his name to go down in history. He wanted to destroy the ring. It was what mister Frodo would have wanted him to do. It was what he must do.  
  
'It's not a Hobbit's place, Samwise Gamgee,' he said to himself.  
  
He started as he heard a commotion behind him. A swarm of Orcs were approaching!  
  
Sam had nowhere to hide in the dark tunnel. He put on the ring.  
  
His whole world changed. Light became dark and dark light; he had the power to do everything and nothing.  
  
He chose the latter.  
  
He could only make out some of the Orcs' words at this distance, but those that he could hear were enough to evoke in him first a sense of shock, then of pain, and then of failure and self-loathing.  
  
Shelob's poison, it seemed, produced the effect of death. It stilled all external signs of life and of movement.  
  
But it did not actually kill its victim - only Shelob herself could do that.  
  
The Orcs had heard that they were to be on the lookout for halflings, and so took Frodo back into their forbidding tower.  
  
Sam watched in horror as the company of snarling Orcs took his dearest Frodo far out of his reach.  
  
When they had gone, Sam took off the ring and vowed never again to put it on his finger. Its effects were too numerous and too dramatic.  
  
Frodo was alive!  
  
Even with all his negative feelings, Sam still felt hope because of that one reality - Frodo was alive.  
  
But the Orcs had him!  
  
Having already felt he had betrayed his master wickedly by allowing him to be killed, he now had to face up to the fact that he had caused his master to fall into the clutches of such foul, evil creatures as the Orcs.  
  
Sam troubled himself with imaginations of how Frodo would feel when he woke up. He would feel betrayed, he would think Sam had deserted him to these creatures, he would think Sam had broken his promise of fidelity unto death.  
  
Frodo would hate him!  
  
Sam tortured himself with images of how the Orcs would treat him.  
  
They would torture him for information, red weals and burns on porcelain skin, a grimace of pain on an angelic face. A moan of agony produced by trembling lips, lips never meant to scream in torment.  
  
Lips made but for kissing, not ever to cry.  
  
Sam fancied he could hear Frodo's cries coming from the very top of that dark, forbidding tower.  
  
'Oh, I'm sorry mister Frodo, I'm so, so sorry.'  
  
Sam no longer had any doubt about his duty: he must rescue his master or perish in the attempt.  
  
'The perishing is more likely, and will be a lot easier anyway,' he said grimly to himself.  
  
Sam walked and walked, and after a time came to the great gates of the tower of Cirith Ungol.  
  
He had failed in his previous attempts to fight darkness with light, but he was willing to try it again - it was what Frodo would have done, he felt sure.  
  
He used the phial of Galadriel to gain entry to the Orcs' tower. The gates, wrought in darkness of dark materials, could not withstand such an onslaught of goodness.  
  
Sam had gained entry to the tower.  
  
Inside, he found desolation.  
  
Orcs lay dead and dying around the corridors. He hurried around the tower, looking for his master.  
  
There was nothing to be found but yet more signs of some internal struggle between the Orcs. Devastation and misery were all about him.  
  
But not within him.  
  
Frodo was alive, and it was that glimmer of hope that kept Sam from despairing at the adversity of their situation.  
  
They might be fighting a losing battle against a power so great it commanded half of Middle Earth . . . they might well never complete their task. But Sam had faith in his mister Frodo, more faith than Frodo had in himself.  
  
Sam did not want to let his spirits get down, and he began to sing. The tune was Bilbo's, but the words his own.  
  
'Though here at journey's end I lie in darkness buried deep, beyond all towers strong and high, beyond all mountains steep, above all shadows rides the Sun and Stars for ever dwell: I will not say the Day is done, nor bid the Stars farewell'  
  
These words put a little more hope into his heart, and he carried climbing the tower through all the debris left by some Orc power-struggle.  
  
Sam began to think the tower might be empty except for corpses. He heard not a sound as he roamed the tower.  
  
But as he climbed yet another set of stairs, he heard a sudden noise.  
  
His first instinct was to cower against a wall, in anticipation of an attack.  
  
But none came.  
  
He listened intently, and heard a rasping Orc-voice almost directly above him!  
  
It was shouting viciously in its own dark tongue, but after a while Sam heard it break into Common Speech.  
  
'Dirty little Halfling! Stop your squealing, or I shall give you something to scream about!'  
  
Sam then heard a whip crack, viciously.  
  
Sam bounded up the spiralling staircase, two steps at a time.  
  
He stood in the doorway to the attic room, gripping the doorframe and breathing heavily.  
  
He looked to see an Orc, hunched over but holding a whip high in the air.  
  
He saw Frodo, lying on a pile of dirty sacking, naked and cowering from the Orc's blows.  
  
He had a red weal across his shoulder, marking the last impact of the whip.  
  
As Sam looked on, horrified, the Orc brought the whip down again. This time it marked Frodo's back about halfway down.  
  
Sam noticed that it had drawn blood.  
  
That was the point where consciousness deserted Sam.  
  
He existed only in the blade of Sting, in his cries of vengeance, in his one purpose of protecting Frodo.  
  
Sam had never realised he had any skill with a blade at all . . . until he blinked his eyes open to find himself standing next to a mutilated and very dead Orc.  
  
He had assumed Frodo was awake, but it seemed he was just instinctively protecting himself against the whip as part of some fevered dream.  
  
He lay, naked on the dirty sacking, moaning as if injured in his dream.  
  
Sam ran to him and knelt down beside him, gripping his shoulder and shaking him.  
  
'Come on, now mister Frodo! We've got to get you out of here! Who knows how long it will be until some more filthy Orcs coming a-running up here to see what's going on?'  
  
'Sam?' a feeble voice replied.  
  
'Yes, it's me mister Frodo, your Sam is here, he's found you!'  
  
'I thought you must be a dream. But all the other dreams were horrible . . .' he tailed off.  
  
Sam's eyes filled with tears as the adrenaline from the fight left him, and he saw what a pitiable sight Frodo was, lying there naked and delirious in a filthy attic room.  
  
He rubbed the tears away fiercely as he began to feel them trembling on the edge of his eyelids.  
  
Sam lay down next to Frodo and held the trembling hobbit in his arms, whispering softly to him.  
  
'It's alright mister Frodo. Your Sam's here now, and everything's going to be all right. Everything's going to be fine. No more Orcs is coming. You're safe, you are, you're safe.  
  
'No, Sam!' shouted Frodo, pulling quickly away and sitting up. 'Nothing is going to be alright! They've taken everything. Do you understand what that means, Sam? They've taken EVERYTHING. The quest has failed.'  
  
Sam looked at Frodo. He looked as broken and dejected as Gollum.  
  
'Why, no, mister Frodo, they didn't take everything!'  
  
Sam wasn't even sure if Frodo was listening.  
  
'I thought you were dead, see. So I, and, I hope you will forgive me for this mister Frodo sir, I took the ring from round your neck with the intention of destroying it myself.'  
  
At this, Frodo's head jerked up, attentive and very much awake.  
  
'So, you have the ring, then?'  
  
Sam nodded.  
  
'Then give it to me! Give it to me at once!'  
  
Frodo frightened Sam with the ferocity in his voice, and immediately took the ring from around his neck, and began to hand it to Frodo.  
  
'I've felt how heavy it is, mister Frodo. And I thought, as we're getting to closer to the place that it was forged, it's only going to be getting heavier. I thought, perhaps, I could help you to carry it?'  
  
On hearing those words, Frodo's whole appearance changed.  
  
'No!' he snapped, 'Why should you have it? It's mine, mine alone! It was given to me! You can't have it. It's mine - my own.'  
  
Sam was shocked to see Frodo behaving like this - he had felt a little of the effect of the ring, and he had a small understanding of how powerful it could be.  
  
But what Sam had felt was nothing compared to what Frodo was feeling.  
  
Frodo clutched the ring to him. He could feel it, branding itself into his palm, marking him and him alone the owner of all the power it posessed. The power to defeat Sauron, the power to make history. The power to be the most famous hobbit that ever lived, and live for ever to tell his tale. Infinite power, power which only he, Frodo, could ever be trusted with. It must not be shared! Never could such power be shared! It was his, his alone, and he would defend it to the very death.  
  
A fiery, lidless eye burned in his mind, promising him infinite power and glory.  
  
Sam stammered, terrified of the change which had overcome his master, 'I'm sorry, it was presumptuous of me. Of course it's your ring, mister Frodo, it's not my place to carry it, of course it isn't.'  
  
Frodo staggered forward, as if he had suddenly awoken from a trance.  
  
'Oh, Sam, I'm so sorry!'  
  
His voice had returned to its normal, soft tones.  
  
Frodo was trembling again, and looked as if he were about to swoon onto the floor right there.  
  
Sam rushed towards him, putting his arms round him to hold him up.  
  
'It's alright, mister Frodo,' he whispered, 'Everything is going to be just fine.' 


End file.
